In efforts to mitigate impacts of US trade sanctions against Huawei and tariff hikes on Chinese imports, the China government has instructed domestic enterprises to purchase more from local tech firms and source more ICs, materials and equipment from Taiwan supply chains, according to industry sources.

Digitimes reports: "Motherboard makers have experienced sluggish demand coming from the PC DIY market, which is likely to shrink further as the US-China trade dispute escalates, according to industry sources.

The PC DIY market has seen weak replacement demand, particularly in China, while shortages of Intel's entry-level to mid-range processors remain an issue.

With the cryptocurrency mining fad dissipating, most motherboard and graphics card players have seen their revenues returning to regular levels. But those who heavily rely on the two business segments have reported sharp drops in sales for the first quarter.

With the US government threatening to extend the 25% tariff to consumer products including notebooks and smartphones, Taiwan's motherboard and graphics card players noted that the impact on their businesses will not be big since they have already increased the prices for products shipping to the US previously when the US increased the tariff to 10%. They have also prepared production sites outside of China as a precaution.

As for China's 25% retaliatory tariff on US-imported products, the firms so far have not seen major impacts.

However, fierce trade tensions are expected to result in weakening demand from the end market. China is especially important as the popularity of the country's PC DIY market is far strong than that of the US.

For motherboards, nearly half of the worldwide shipments go to China and if demand continues falling, Taiwan suppliers' sales in 2019 are expected to be severely undermined.

At the moment, the China market accounts for big portions of the motherboard businesses of Asustek Computer and Gigabyte Technology, but the proportions are relatively low for Micro-Star International (MSI), ASRock and Elitegroup Computer Systems (ECS).

MSI has reported consolidated revenues of NT$29.49 billion (US$939.26 million) for the first quarter of 2019, down 0.9% sequentially and 7.2% on year. The company achieved EPS of NT$1.55 for the quarter, weaker than NT$2.49 of the same quarter a year ago, but higher than fourth-quarter-2018's NT$0.80."

Samsung Electronics has reported operating profits of KRW6.2 trillion (US$5.3 billion) on consolidated revenues of KRW52.4 trillion for the first quarter of 2019. The profit and revenue results show declines of 60% and 13%, respectively, on year.

Micro-Star International (MSI) has reported net profits increased 22.4% on year to NT$6.04 billion (US$195.7 million) in 2018, with EPS coming to NT$7.15 thanks to significant profits from its gaming notebooks and monitors, and strong demand in first-quarter 2018 for graphics cards from the cryptocurrency mining industry.

Driven by sharp price falls for NAND flash chips, global shipments of SSDs are estimated to surge 20-25% in 2019 from 200 million units seen in 2018, and PCIe SSDs are expected to emerge as a new mainstream offering by the end of 2019 with a market share of 50% on a par with SATA SSDs, according to industry sources.

Shortages of Intel's CPUs are expected to worsen in the second quarter compared to the first as demand for Chromebooks, which are mostly equipped with Intel's entry-level processors, enters the high period, according to Digitimes Research.

Acer will introduce an array of new products as well as a new brand at an event to be held in New York in April as it is diversifying its offerings to offset the impact of the declining PC market, according to company chairman and CEO Jason Chen

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Taiwan-based graphics card players, Nvidia and semiconductor players including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), Global Unichip and Faraday Technology are expected to see their first-quarter financial results drop dramatically on year as a result of the fading of the cryptocurrency mining business.

The top-5 notebook brands saw better-than-expected results with combined shipments falling 21% on month in January 2019, as the market has entered the slow season in the first quarter, helping ease Intel CPU shortages. The top-5's shipments also represent an increase from those recorded in the same month a year ago.

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Reports Digitimes.com.... "Motherboard makers are likely to see their shipments fall dramatically in the first quarter of 2019, due to seasonal factors coupled with lingering sluggish demand from the crypto mining sector, according to industry sources.

The sources noted that worldwide motherboard shipments in 2018 were down over 10% from those in 2017 as demand for hardware upgrade remained weak, while Intel's entry-level and mid-range processors were in serious shortages.

Shipments are expected to continue slipping in 2019, but the decline is likely to be less than 10% with Asustek Computer, Micro-Star International (MSI) and ASRock having a chance of maintaining their volumes at the 2018 levels, the sources said.

Gigabyte Technology, Biostar Microtech International and Elitegroup Computer Systems (ECS) are likely to suffer from declines due to high shipment proportions of entry-level products, said the sources.

Vendors' profitability from their motherboard businesses is also expected to slump in 2019, the sources noted.

In 2018, worldwide brand motherboard shipments were around 40 million units with Asustek shipping around 14-15 million, Gigabyte 10 million, MSI six million and ASRock four million.

With demand from the cryptocurrency mining sector plunging, the gaming sector will become the main marketing focus for the vendors in 2019. Nvidia has recently launched its new GeForce RTX 2060 GPU priced starting US$349, while AMD is scheduled to begin promoting its new Radeon VII GPU using TSMC 7nm process in February."

"Apple Inc’s (AAPL.O) biggest iPhone assembler Foxconn Technology Group (2317.TW) has let go around 50,000 contract workers in China since October, months earlier than normal, Nikkei reported on Friday.
The scale of the cuts is not necessarily deeper than previous years, it is simply significantly earlier, the report said, citing an industry source familiar with the situation. "

USB Type-C interface devices are increasingly applied to a variety of consumer electronics gadgets, prompting major Taiwan IC design houses to deepen their deployments in related chip solutions. But prices of such chips are likely to fall by over 20% in 2019 due partly to more chipmakers racing to vie for orders with lower quotes and partly to terminal vendors not eager to stockpile inventories amid the loosening of tight foundry capacity supply, according to industry sources.

Beginners Guide: Install/Remove Intel Socket LGA1156 CPU and HeatsinkNov 18 | Beginners GuidesRating:Installing a socket LGA1156 Intel Core i3/i5/i7 processor into a fresh motherboard as part of a new PC build can be intimidating step, particularly if you've never worked inside a computer before. PCSTATS received a few emails from novice readers on this subject, so we thought it worthwhile to lay out the steps for you in this Beginners Guide.